3490-A20 THROUGH ESCON
ITEM: RTA000079203
We have a customer who have ES/9000 connecting 3490-A20 thru ESCON.
He will connect between 3490-A20 and RS/6000(590) with F/C #2754.
CURRENT SYSTEM:
+------------------+ +------------------+
| 9421-440 | ESCON |--------------| ESCON | 3490-A20 |
| +-------+ +-------+ |
| | ESCON |--------------| ESCON | |
+------------------+ +------------------+
FUTURE SYSTEM(NOW PLANNING):
+------------------+ +------------------+
| 9421-440 | ESCON |--------------| ESCON | 3490-A20 |
| +-------+ +-------+ |
| | ESCON | +------| ESCON | |
+------------------+ | +------------------+
+------------------+ |
| RS/6000 | ESCON |-------+
| (590) | #2754 |
+------------------+
We do not have any manuals about ESCON connection with RS/6K,
so please tell me that how to display on 3490-A20 display
when requesting mount(assign?) the cartridge tape to 3490-A20.
In my understanding, 3490 displays VOL-SER and MVS messages on the
panel in MVS environment.
ANSWER
R: ESCON and 3490 questions.
Firstly, the hardware configuration you have listed above
appears to be correct. Secondly, when in normal operation using
standard AIX commands (tar, backup/restore, dd, cpio), the
message display on the 3490 will not be changed. You will have
to write your own code to manipulate the 3490's display, or use
a piece of software that was designed to do this (I am unaware
of any IBM products that provide this functionality).
The software and documentation (AIX Parallel and ESCON Channel
Tape Attachment/6000 Installation and User's Guide, GA32-0311)
lists certain function calls that can be used to modify the tape
drive display.
Chapter 16, I/O control Requests for Tape Devices lists the
following ioctl() request:
MTIOCLD. This ioctl() request performs a display operation on
the device.
For more information on the flags and structures of this call,
please see the above referenced documentation.
ANSWER
The driver for the ESCON attached tape drives on the RISC
System/6000 does not request tapes. The ESCON driver treats the
3490 as any other standard AIX tape drive. This means that it
assumes that it has complete control of the tape drive and that
the correct tape is in the tape drive when the tape command
is executed.
Just like any other AIX tape drive, when a AIX command is
excuted, like tar or backup/restore, AIX assumes that you have
the tape you want in the drive, the tape drive does not prompt
you for a tape, but the command line might (depending on what
command and/or flags you use).
Therefore, the bottom line is that no message is displayed on
the 3490 when it is accessed by the RISC unless you are running
some additional piece of software which does display messages on
the tape drive.
Thank you.
S e a r c h - k e y w o r d s:
3490 ESCON AIX
WWQA: ITEM: RTA000079203 ITEM: RTA000079203
Dated: 11/1995 Category: ITSAI6000HW
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